


And the Kelpie Catastrophe

by Rebster04



Category: The Librarians (TV 2014)
Genre: Case Fic, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-30
Updated: 2017-09-30
Packaged: 2019-01-07 08:01:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,587
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12228828
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rebster04/pseuds/Rebster04
Summary: The Librarians investigate some strange occurrences near a Loch in Scotland





	And the Kelpie Catastrophe

**Author's Note:**

> I am back from a short (but really long) hiatus, apologies! Hope you enjoy this story! I don't have a beta, so I apologise if there's any mistakes! Enjoy :)

Baird dropped herself into her chair, folded her arms on her desk and let her head fall into them. 

“Long day, eh?” Jake smirked. The loud huffing sound she replied with told him all he needed to know. Shaking his head, he returned to the blinking cursor on the screen in front of him.

“Hrumpph-mmhhrrph…”

Jake laughed without looking up from his laptop, “Baird, I’m fluent in about a dozen modern languages and a few ancient ones, but I didn’t catch that.” He smiled, and clicked his tongue, “Can you try enunciate your words?”

Huffing, Baird lifted her head, “I’m getting too old for this.”

“What have team trouble been up to now?” he asked knowingly. 

Although not differing greatly in age with Cassandra and Ezekiel, both he and Baird seemed to have a more mature attitude to librarianing.

“Cassandra has been socialising with the mermaids in the antiquities wing, which gives me all sorts of drowned red-head anxiety and Ezekiel attempted to gain access to NASA’s satellites because he-,” she lifted her hands and motioned air quotes, “-‘just wanted to check out the awesome aliens that they definitely know about, eh?’” Baird let her head fall back down onto her arms.

It had been a few weeks since the clippings book had notified them of anything worth investigating. This meant Baird and the Annex were suffering from the effects of three bored librarians. Although, Jacob was thoroughly enjoying some time off to add to his repertoire of architectural essays.  


-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

“We got a live one, baby!!” Jake hollered as the clippings book flipped over several pages and thrashed around on the stand. Ezekiel fell from the armchair he had been lounging on, accidentally knocking over Cassandra’s teacup. 

Her squeals of annoyance changed into excited ones as she realised the cause of Jake’s shouting, “Ooh! I was starting to think we were never going back out in the field again!”

Ezekiel brushed off the remaining liquid from the sleeve of his hoodie, “Out in the field? What are you, a detective?”

Baird moved across to the room and stood before the clippings book. The others came to stand beside her, Cassandra trying to peek over the taller woman’s shoulder. Both revealed pages were covered in different newspaper clippings displaying various headlines all with similar themes. 

Jake uncrossed his arms to point to one of the headlines, “Family missing, campsite near loch found deserted. Hmm, doesn’t sound like anythin’ magical.”

Ezekiel scoffed, “It sounds like everything magical! It could literally be anything at all!”

Cassandra gleefully piped up from behind Baird, “Does this mean we get to go to a Loch in Scotland?”

“Do we get to go camping?”

“Ugh, it’s always so rainy, do I need to bring a jacket?”

“Do we need to hike? Exercise doesn’t agree with me.”

“There’s no phone signal in the wild!”

Baird turned around swiftly and raised her arms into the air, “Enough!” The three librarians looked at her with wide eyes.

“We need to do some research into what we’re dealing with before we think about camping, exercising or phone signal, okay?” she nodded to herself and turned back to face the clippings book, “First of all…we need to learn how to pronounce some of these Scottish Lochs.”

Jake pushed out his chest and moved between Cassandra and Ezekiel, “I believe I can help with that…” 

Baird stood out of his way as he hunkered down in front of the newspaper articles.

Jake clapped his hands together, “Alright, so the campers had set up camp beside Loch Lubnaig and come mornin’ they were gone, but their camp and vehicle were left behind.” 

Cassandra piped up from behind Baird, “How many campers disappeared?”

“All of them…three kids and their parents….the McIntyre’s.”

Baird lowered her head, “God, I hate when it’s kids.”

“Was everything left behind or were any valuables missing?” Ezekiel studied the pictures of the deserted campsite with a magnifying glass.

Cassandra lifted another news clipping from the book, “Doesn’t mention anything about stolen items, just that the circumstances of the disappearances were suspicious.”

Baird’s brow furrowed, “What made it suspicious?”

Shrugging her shoulders, the red-head replied, “Parents taking away their kids on vacation and then they vanish without a trace?” The other librarians turned to face her, “I don’t see how that’s not suspicious.”

Jake closed over the clippings book, “So, what’s the plan Colonel?”

Eve walked over to her desk to grab her jacket, “We are going to visit Loch Lubnaig, scout it out and investigate these suspicious circumstances…”

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

The sun had begun to set behind the hills on Loch Lubnaig, casting a red glow across the trees. The scarlet tint of the water gave the loch a sinister look. The glare from the low sun hit the windscreen on the Jeep. 

“I can barely see a thing!” Eve lifted her hand from the steering wheel to pull the visor down and block out the sun from her eyes.

“The road is pretty clear anyways,” Cassandra chirped from the passenger seat, “but I wasn’t expecting it to be so sunny.” She crumpled the empty packet of pretzels that she had brought for the trip and followed the road on the map sat across her legs.

“It’s still freezing!” Ezekiel chittered from behind her, “should’ve brought that hat…”

Jake laughed out loud. Ezekiel was wearing a large parka with a furry hood that he had zipped up to encompass his face. Jake wondered how he was able to hear any of the conversation going on in the Jeep.

Cassandra pointed to a sign at the end of the straight, “The campsite should be just round this bend.”

Baird brought the Jeep to a stop and everyone sat silent staring ahead. There was a clearing ahead where the campsite sat in the middle slightly down a hill. Just beyond the few tents that had been set up were the crimson waters of the loch. A police line had been set up in front of the site with several officers stood in full uniform. 

The librarians and their guardian stepped out of the Jeep and congregated at the open boot for Baird to give them their instructions. She reached in to the backseat to retrieve two flashlights, a pair of night vision goggles and a set of walkie-  
talkies. Handing one of the lights and the goggles to Jake, she began to give her orders.

“You take Ezekiel and check around the campsite, mainly the surrounding wooded area. Look for anything magic-y or suspicious.” 

Ezekiel grabbed the goggles out of Jake’s hand to put them over his eyes, “What’re these for?”

Baird snatched them back off him and smacked the side of his head, passing them back to Jake, “The sun is almost gone, do you want to be able to see or not?” 

Cassandra smirked, “He won’t be able to see if he keeps that hood up…”

Baird smiled as Ezekiel huffed pushing his hood down. She gave him one of the walkie-talkies and passed the other flashlight to Cassandra, “Red and I will chat to the locals and see if we can gain any more information other than suspicious circumstances.”

The team split up and went in search of some answers.

Cassandra pocketed the flashlight and caught up with Baird who had steamed ahead towards the on duty cops, “So what do you think the police know at this stage?”

“Not sure, let’s find out.”

The cop eyed the two ladies as they walked down the slope towards the police cordon. He stepped out and raised up his arm, “Stop there ladies, that’s far enough. Where’d you think you’re going?”

Baird moved a little closer and stuck her arm out to shake the man’s hand, “Evening officer, we’re the Librarians, we’ve been asked to come and scope out the area.”

The policeman’s eyes glazed over and he replied without thought, “Aw I see, you must be from the National Trust. Here to see about the strange wildlife that’s been in the area recently?”

Cassandra eyed Baird, “strange wildlife?”

The policeman continued to talk without hesitancy, “Yeah, campers and hikers in the area have reported seeing odd horse like creatures.”

Confusion graced Cassandra’s face as she turned to peek into the woods behind the Jeep, “Are horses not usually seen near the loch?”

He tutted, “Not horses like these, we got reports coming in talking about horses walking on their hind legs.”

Baird spluttered, “Like humans?”

“We’re not sure yet, that’s why you’re here, isn’t it?” He tilted his head forward slightly and gazed at the two women.

Cassandra lifted the flashlight from her pocket and enthusiastically saluted him with it, “Yes Siree!”

Baird rolled her eyes at the younger woman, turning back to the policeman, “Is there a chance we could have a look around the campsite?”

He nodded and lifted the police line for them to duck under.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

The sun finally fell behind the hills and the sky was darkening by the minute. The wood had lost its menacing red glow and was now shrouded in darkness. If campers had gotten lost during the night, there was no way they were finding their way  
back to camp even if they were equipped with flashlights. 

“I cannot see a thing,” Ezekiel smacked a bug into his neck, “Why do we always get stuck with the crappy part of the job?”

Jake grumbled, “Quit complainin’ and give me that damned flashlight.” 

Ezekiel stopped, “That’s not fair! You can’t have the goggles and the flashlight!”

Jake turned in the darkness and looked at the outline of Ezekiel in the moonlight, “Will you shu-“

A twig snapped loudly in the distance. Both men whirled round to face the direction the noise came from.

Ezekiel pushed himself into Jake’s side whispering, “What was that?”

“I dunno, let’s go find out…”Jake’s voice cracked slightly.

Ezekiel looked at the older man incredulously, “Are you kidding me? Haven’t you ever seen any horror movie ever?”

The bright light from the moon shone onto the trees making them seem taller and more threatening than before. More snapping sounds were coming from the darkest part of the wood, then suddenly silence.

Jake put his hand over Ezekiel’s mouth, “Shh, shh, do you hear that?”

Ezekiel shook his head under Jake’s grip, “Exactly, what happened to all the noise?”

The wood was void of sound. The constant hum of insects and life within the wood had vanished. Jake dropped his hand from the younger man’s mouth and looked around him wildly. Ezekiel could hear his heartbeat thumping in his chest as the  
blood began rushing through his ears.

Static buzzed abruptly, “Hey guys?”

Both men jumped out of their skins, startled by the noise. If whatever it was snapping the twigs didn’t know they were there, they did now due to Ezekiel’s shrill shriek. 

“You guys there? Eve and I found something.”

Jake’s hand quivered as he reached for the walkie-talkie clipped to Ezekiel’s belt. Lifting it to his mouth, he tried to calm his breathing before responding to the women. Ezekiel was as white as a sheet and had doubled over with a hand to his chest trying to stem his heartbeat. 

“Yeah? Go for Stone.”

Cassandra’s voice filtered through the talkie, “We’re gonna meet back up at the Jeep to see what we’ve learned. How long are you guys gonna be?”

Jake wiped at the sweat on his brow as he looked for any source of light from the campsite. Seeing pure darkness he sighed, “I can’t see the campsite anymore, so it may take us a little while to get back down this hill.”

Ezekiel was standing upright again looking around for any signs of the road or for something familiar. Both men began on the path they had followed in the first place from the campsite. They were both completely unaware of the tall, slender creature hunched behind the row of trees watching them return to the campsite.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

“We should call Jenkins and see if he knows anything about horses walking like people,” Baird whispered to Cassandra as they walked towards the Jeep, ducking under the police line. The younger woman nodded, so Baird continued, “Did Jake say if they found anything?”

“No, they took a while to answer so I don’t know what they were doing,” Cassandra reached for the door handle on the Jeep and both women got into the car.

Baird turned to face the back seat and stretched for the tablet Ezekiel had brought for the car journey. She opened it and then a beeping sound was heard as they device tried to connect to Jenkins back in the annex. Baird propped the device up on the windshield. Eventually the caretaker appeared on the screen.

“This better be very important Colonel, I’m dealing with some very fragile work at the moment.”

Cassandra piped up, “Hi Mr. Jenkins, we had a question about the case we’re working on.”

This seemed to pique the older gentleman’s interest, “Oh I see, I didn’t realise you had finally gotten a clipping.”

Baird ushered the conversation on, “Yeah, yeah, but we didn’t and still don’t have much to go on at the moment apart from a missing family. We were hoping that you could help us with something?”

The corner of his lip rose slightly, “Ask away.”

She continued, “Alright, so the clippings book alerted us to a family of campers who went missing in Scotland near a Loch. No other information than th-...”

“All of their belongings were left behind including their car…” interrupted Cassandra.

“Yes,” Baird sustained through gritted teeth, “and then once we got here and spoke to the police on the scene, they mentioned something about a horse being seen in the area.”

“Well, seeing horses in Scotland is not an unusual occurrence,” replied Jenkins.

“Indeed, however this horse was seen walking on its hind legs,” concluded Baird.

Cassandra was nodding vigorously with wide eyes in the passenger seat. 

“I see, that is odd.” The man was pensive for a moment, he was so still that Baird thought the connection had been lost.

Waiting anxiously to hear the caretaker’s expert opinion on the supernatural, Cassandra couldn’t help herself, “Come on Mr. Jenkins, whaddaya think?”

Baird rolled her eyes at the red head.

“You said you were in Scotland, yes?”

Both women answered simultaneously, “Yes.”

“And the family had set up camp near a loch?”

“Uh-huh.”

“And the reports coming in about the horse confirmed it had been walking on its hind legs?”

“Yep.”

“From what I’ve heard I believe it may be something akin to Scottish folklore.”

Both women looked at each other slightly confused with Baird voicing, “Something akin to what?”

“Kelpies.”

Baird now just looked downright frustrated, “You do realise that you aren’t helping us right now?”

Cassandra giggled, “I know what kelpies are,” her smile faltered slightly, “at least I think I do.”

Jenkins continued unfazed by the Colonel’s growing anger, “Kelpies were demons that usually took the form of beautiful horses. The lured children onto their backs and then rode into the loch to drown the children.”  
Baird paled, “Pleasant.”

“Kelpies can alter their shape and usually take the form of whatever would entice the children into the water. However, they don’t enjoy company, so hopefully there’s only one. They found more pleasure in attracting and killing children in the loch rather than adults, although they were known to keep their original appearance when targeting adults to strike fear in them. The difficult thing with this means the people who saw their original shape didn’t typically live to tell the tale. Most adults who were targeted weren’t enticed into the water, rather scared into it.”

Cassandra’s eyes glazed over slightly as she raised her hands in front of her. She began to flick unseen images across the windshield of the car, “I’ve read something on this topic before. The horses were sticky….sticky, couldn’t get off if they tried…something with antlers, not a horse, deer, antlers, tall, dark…maybe a person, but with horns, or a tall horse with antlers…walking on two legs…” she lowered her arms and turned, defeated, towards Baird, “I lost it.” 

The sun had set completely now and the woodland had become pure black. The campsite down the slope had small lanterns that hung lifelessly around on thick wiring, giving the campsite an eerie red burning glow. The police had left the taped off zone to sit in their cars as the darkness had brought with it a chill. Outside of the Jeep everything was still, there was no wind. No movement.

“So what should we be looking for and how can we help?”

Jenkins was motionless on the screen.

Cassandra rubbed at her eyes to wipe away the last of her hallucinations. 

Baird lifted the tablet from the windscreen, “Jenkins, can you hear me? What do we need to look for?”

Jenkins vanished from the display and a black screen appeared claiming the battery had gone too low to support a video call. Baird grunted in frustration and threw the dead device back into the back of the car and covered her face with her hands, “Great, what do we do now?”

Cassandra was staring intently out of the window, “Do you see that?”

Baird let her head fall back against the headrest, “See what?”

“I’m not sure, it’s too dark,” she squinted to try and make sense of the darkness.

Baird moved forward in her seat to see past the red head, “I don’t see anything.”

Cassandra’s face dropped as she whispered to Baird, “It’s moving.”

“Moving where?” 

Her breathing hitched, “…towards us…”

Suddenly something crashed into the back of the Jeep jolting the women in their seats. The back doors of the car opened and Jake and Ezekiel jumped into the car yelling, “GO, GO, GO NOW, DRIVE!”

Both men were breathing heavily and were dirtier than they had been when they got out of the car. Baird sprang into action turning the engine on and screeching out of the small car park. Cassandra turned in her seat, face pale with adrenaline and fear. 

Baird looked at the men using the rear view mirror, “What in the hell kind of entrance was that?”

Ezekiel had his knees up on the seat and was looking wildly out the back of the car, he acted as though he didn’t hear Eve. He whacked Jake’s chest with the back of his hand, “do you still see it? Is it there?”

Cassandra eyes widened even further, if that was possible, “see what? What did you see?”

Jake looked to her severely as he fastened his belt, “We ain’t entirely sure, but I can tell ya sumthin’, it wasn’t human.”

She undid her own seatbelt to turn wholly round to face him, “Do you remember what it looked like?”

Ezekiel paused to look over his shoulder at the stunned librarian, “terrifying.”

Baird continued to drive at speed along the dark road. She slowed slightly as they turned a bend and then unexpectedly slammed on the brakes as a tall, blackened creature with thin bony antlers was stood hunched over in the centre of the road. Its eyes beamed bright yellow as Baird pulled on the steering wheel to avoid crashing into the unnerving being. The car skidded towards the edge of the road before slamming into a tree which sent the Jeep rolling down the slope towards the water. The car rolled back onto the wheels and continued on its path into the icy depths of the loch. The creature watched as the car begin to submerge slowly, its occupants deathly silent.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

Freezing water from the loch flooded in from each of the broken windows. The water inside the car was almost to their waists, making it harder for them to move. Cassandra and Ezekiel had been knocked unconscious during the roll down the slope before they plunged into the loch. Baird and Jacob tried to jump into action to remove their seatbelts and evacuate from the sinking car. The bleak darkness made it very difficult to see what was happening inside and outside of the car. 

Baird’s military training instinctively kicked in as she instructed Jake, “You grab Ezekiel and get to the shore, get him out first while we’re still above the water and then get yourself to safety.”

Jake nodded without hesitation, “What about you?”

“I’ll get Cassandra out and then meet you on land.”

Jake grabbed the thick collar of Ezekiel’s coat and pulled him towards the window. The water was up to Jake’s chest which made it easier to push the thin librarian out of the window. He followed shortly after and began swimming for the edge of the water.

Eve continued to tug blindly at her seatbelt, she growled to herself, “come on, come on!”

Cassandra was lying lifelessly across the windscreen face down. She hadn’t been wearing her belt, thought Eve, please be okay. The seatbelt holding Baird in her seat had jammed and wouldn’t release. The water had risen above the windows and only gave her a small amount of oxygen left near the roof of the car. She could almost reach it if the belt would give her some extra length. Soon the car would be completely submerged.

Sucking in her final breath Eve gave the belt one final swift tug. The offending piece of plastic snapped allowing her to move towards Cassandra and then for the window. 

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

Jacob reached the edge and pulled himself and Ezekiel out of the bitter loch. He turned to face the car to see the moonlight glinting off the last of the roof as it finally sunk fully under the water. He could see his breath in front of him. It had been cold before, but after being soaked he was freezing now.

Ezekiel coughed and spluttered painfully as he tried to sit up.

Jake rushed over to him, shaking off his tightening muscles and pushed him back towards the ground, “Woah, don’t sit up too fast, ya don’t know what injuries ya have yet.”

Ezekiel nodded groggily as he lay back against the dirt. Jake moved to his side to check him over. It was difficult to see in the pitch black, but he could make out from the gleam of moonlight that he had a gash over his eyebrow. He then felt the back of his own head and could feel a warm thick substance coming from a wound there. They were lucky that they hadn’t been injured any further.

Ezekiel was visibly shaking from the cold. His thick jacket was water logged and had become very heavy. He opened his eyes slightly and laid them on a worrying Jake who was sat beside him.

“Whe…where’s Ca…Cassie?”

Jake offered Ezekiel an anxious look before standing up shakily and walking to the foot of the water, “Come on Baird, where are you?!” he whispered to himself.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

Eve felt the icy waters of the loch grip at her lungs as she struggled to keep the black from filling her vision. She knew she would lose consciousness soon. She had managed to push Cassandra towards the window, but her floral skirt had caught on the glass of the broken windows and she couldn’t see under the murky water to remove it. Eve moved slowly to her own window and entered the black depths of the loch. She pulled herself over the hood of the car and reached out to feel something of Cassandra’s. Her fingertips brushed against some strands of hair which she followed to the younger woman’s shoulders. She angled herself to place her feet against the door of the Jeep and grabbed at Cassandra’s jacket. Bracing herself, she used all her strength to pull Cassandra free of the car. 

Her vision swam. The black spots were becoming harder to deny. Her lungs were beginning to burn from the lack of oxygen. She kicked as hard as she could with Cassandra by her side and finally broke the top of the water.  
Jake watched from the shoreline as Cassandra’s head appeared a few dozen feet away from the edge of the water, followed momentarily by Baird’s.

The air burned as it entered her lungs. She let herself float on top of the water as she gave her breathing time to return to normal. It wasn’t until she heard a muffled cry from the shoreline that she remembered where she was and who she was with. She straightened up and wildly felt in the water around her for Cassandra.

Catching on something, she began to swim towards the shouting at the shoreline dragging along whatever she had grabbed onto. She could tell in the slight amount of moonlight that she was pulling the librarian with her. Jake met her at the foot of the water and she finally let go of Cassandra as Jake dragged her seemingly lifeless body onto the muddy shore. 

“I got her…” Jake kneeled by the young woman and placed his ear over her nose and mouth. He watched her chest meticulously. Eve remained by the edge of the water as she watched on helplessly.

“She’s not breathin’,” he was quick to state before placing the heel of his hand on her chest. He started to deliver CPR to the pale red head, “Come on Cassie!”

Seconds seemed to turn into minutes. Minutes into hours. Then after a small gurgle in the back of her throat Cassandra coughed up a few mouthfuls of murky black water. Jake helped roll her onto her side as she let the contents of her stomach following shortly after. 

Baird looked towards the sky to stop the tears that threatened to fall from her eyes. She continued to breathe deeply through her nose and let a small sob softly escape her lips. Jake took off his jacket and quickly placed it under Cassandra’s head. Her eyes remained closed but she was definitely breathing. Eve wiped at her nose and crawled over to her librarians. Jake wrapped his arms around her and allowed himself to breathe a deep sigh of relief. 

“Arm…my arms…really sore.”

Jake and Baird broke apart and went to help the other two who hadn’t skipped on injury following the crash. Ezekiel was laying as still as he could so as not to jar his sore arm. Baird stood behind him and moved him towards one of the trees near the water so he was sitting up.

Baird stooped down beside the young man and surveyed his bloodied jacket sleeve, “Can you take your jacket off?”

He shook his head delicately and mumbled, “Nah, too heavy.”

“Okay,” she gently pulled the sleeve up to reveal a long bloodied gash. She grimaced. It wasn’t too deep, but it had bruised very rapidly. She wasn’t a doctor by any means, but she was sure that it had been fractured or possibly broken.

Ezekiel groaned weakly as she returned his sleeve to where it had been. She removed her own trench coat and then the plaid blue shirt that she had been wearing leaving her in her black t-shirt. Slipping back into her wet coat to try keep the cold away, she tied her shirt around his neck and then manoeuvred his injured arm into it trying to ignore Ezekiel’s weak protests.

She strained a smile, “There you go…all better.” 

She wasn’t so sure herself.

Meanwhile, Jake continued to monitor Cassandra’s laboured breathing. Her chest was just about maintaining an unsteady rise and fall. His adrenaline was beginning to dissipate when Baird approached them. 

“She okay?”

“She hasn’t opened her eyes yet, but she’s breathin’,” he was holding onto her wrist checking for a steady pulse.

Baird stepped over her legs and sat at her side, “Is she hurt anywhere else?” She looked over the red head.

Jake growled and placed her wrist back at her side, “Damnit Baird, I didn’t even think to check...goddamn.”

It was still hard to see in the dark and Cassandra’s energetic florals didn’t make checking for injuries any easier. With the small amount of moonlight, Baird could make out a rip in Cassandra’s thin jacket and dress that had dark crimson surrounding it. 

“Shit.”

Baird felt around the wound on her side and hissed before quickly retracting her fingers. She placed the injured digit into her mouth before mumbling, “Sharp…maybe glass or metal or something. Something cold.”

Jake pulled at the rip in her dress to reveal a long thin piece of glass stuck in the young woman’s side, “This ain’t good. We need to get to a hospital or get bandages or something.”

Baird wiped her fingers on her cool, wet jeans before looking around her. Her eyes came to rest on the distant glow from what must have been the campsite. She whipped her head back round to Jake, “The police!” 

Jake’s face morphed into a mixture of confusion and apprehension. 

“The police were at the campsite! They’ll help us!”

A grunt from Ezekiel interrupted Baird’s hopeful shouts, “That thing…the thing that was on the road…the scary thing.”

A long pause settled over the group before Ezekiel allowed his last words send a shiver down Baird’s spine, “It’s still out there.”

Jake cleared his throat, “He’s got a point. How do we know if we’ll make it before it attacks again?”

Baird’s expression darkened.

“How far from the camp did we get?”

They both considered the very distant glow. 

“I’ll go.”

Jake looked at her, exasperated, “Ya can’t go yourself! What use is that with no communication devices?”

Baird seemed desperate, “There’s no way we can leave these two…it’ll target them.”

“We have to stick together,” he insisted.

She let out a small humourless laugh, “and watch Cassandra bleed out together?”

“I’ll carry her.”

She looked pensive, “And Ezekiel?”

Ezekiel coughed slightly clearing his throat, reminding the other two that he was still there, “Eh…my legs are fine. I’ll walk.”

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

The group slowly trudged up the muddy slope to the road leading back to the campsite.

Baird wrapped her arm around Ezekiel’s waist to keep him from stumbling. As they reached the road, they could clearly make out the skid marks Eve had left on the road as she tried to avoid whatever had caused their accident. Jake shifted 

Cassandra slightly so her head was against his chest and not hanging off his arm. 

Baird and Jake shared a brief look of uneasiness before they set off on the trek back to the camp. The sounds of wildlife seemed deafening as the foursome slogged along the shadowy road. Baird could barely take it anymore. She needed to hear  
something other than their breathing.

“What scared you guys before?”

“Um,” Jake was thoughtful for a moment, trying to find the correct words and phrases that would best describe what he had seen, “It definitely wasn’t of this world.”

“Was it the same thing that ran us off the road?”

“Yes.” 

Ezekiel was quick to answer. He was positive.

“Cassandra and I spoke to Jenkins,” Jake raised his eyebrows, “he said that it was most likely a kelpie.” She took a deep breath remembering the gleaming yellow eyes of the creature on the road, was that what Cassandra had seen before Jake and  
Ezekiel got in the car? 

She paused for a moment as a horrible thought entered her mind, how long had it been watching them?

“Baird?” 

Jake was looking at her concerned, “You aren’t in shock, are ya?”

She shook her head, “Jenkins said that they like to drown children.”

Ezekiel laughed mirthlessly, “It certainly tried to drown us too.”

A small whimper left Cassandra’s pale blue lips. They all came to a stop. 

Jake repositioned her slightly to reveal more of her face, “Cassie?” She didn’t respond, but she was still breathing.

Ezekiel placed his arm around Baird’s neck and leant some of his weight onto her shoulders, “How far away is this camp again?”

Jake called Cassandra’s name a second time before staring at the other two grimly, “We gotta get back as soon as we can or we might not all make it.”

They all began to walk a little faster towards the glow of the camp, Baird and a weak Ezekiel walking slightly ahead of Jake who was beginning to tire from carrying Cassandra. The camp was beginning to get closer. They were only a few more  
minutes away.

Jake kept his eyes on the limp librarian in his arms, “Did Jenkins say he’d have a door ready for us?” 

Eve stopped dead. 

They hadn’t been able to finish their conversation with the caretaker. 

They hadn’t been able to organise any transport home.

With no Jeep, there was no way they’d make it back to the original doorway for the annex.

“Shit.”

Ezekiel looked at her nervously, “What?”

She glanced at him plainly, “We don’t have a door home anywhere near us now that we’ve lost the car.”

Jake shook his head and whispered, “I think that’s the least of our worries.”

“What?” Both Ezekiel and Baird turned to face him. His eyes were as wide as saucers. He released his grip on Cassandra’s calf to point just behind the two in front.

They turned around and were faced with the tall, dark creature only a few hundred feet away. It was staring at them, the shine of its eye as bright as Baird remembered in the car. It wasn’t quite a horse, it had some human like characteristics to it.  
It seemed to be over 7 feet tall and the thin, almost sinister looking antlers added to its great height. It was stood in between the group and the camp, stopping them from continuing to the safety of the camp.

Slowly, the creature began to jitter advancing towards them.

Baird found her legs rooted to the floor. No one could move out of fear. It was definitely the kelpie. 

The creature’s eyes darkened as it closed in on the librarians. Jake pulled Cassandra’s body tight against his chest as he closed his eyes. A quiet hum began to sound in the distance. Ezekiel assumed it was his heart thumping right through his chest. The kelpie smirked at them showing a few rows of sharp, serrated teeth. 

This is it, thought Baird. She didn’t think that she would be drowned, but that her fear would consume her entirely. The hum in the distance gradually became louder and clearer.

The kelpie reached a long thin arm out towards Ezekiel and sluggishly dragged a jagged nail across his cheek cutting the skin under his eye, causing him extreme pain. He found that he couldn’t scream, recoil or stop the creature from causing him any further harm which made him even more petrified. Baird felt rage bubble in her stomach and begin to spill into every fibre of her being. The kelpie moved over to her and lifted its hand toward her own face. Suddenly she was able to thrust forward at the creature and push it away from her with all her strength. The hum was now a loud roar. The kelpie, taken by surprise at Eve’s ability to move, staggered back a few feet.

The roar was now accompanied with light as a large SUV came into view. The kelpie rapidly turned to face the source of the blinding light and then began to lunge toward the tree line, but it was too late. The SUV rammed into the creature causing it to hit the ground with a harsh thud and then grate along the road before coming to a stop slightly behind the librarians. All was quiet. The SUV had pulled over to the edge of the road. The kelpie was unmoving and bloodied. Cassandra shifted  
slightly under Jake’s tight grip and gradually opened her eyes. 

“…Jake?” Her voice was hoarse and croaky.

The group turned to face her as Jake lowered himself to the ground to sit her down. He rested her head on his stretched out legs. Baird and Ezekiel joined them in sitting down, completely exhausted from the day’s events.

“Looks like I got here right on time.”

Three heads whipped round to face Jenkins as he stood at the open door of the SUV. 

Jake chuckled softly, laughing at their luck. Baird wiped at Ezekiel’s bloody face with the sleeve of her jacket.

Jenkins huffed, back to his usual hassled self, calling from the car, “Well, what are you all waiting for? Time to go home!”

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

“Is it broken?” Ezekiel asked through gritted teeth.

Jenkins had him sitting on his work bench as he examined the young man’s arm, “It’s fractured, not broken.”

Pushing his glasses that magnified his vision further up on his nose, he cleaned out Ezekiel’s wound. The younger man hissed as the alcohol Jenkins was using started to sting. He glanced over to the makeshift bed near the door. Cassandra was pale and fragile looking, but alive. Baird was slumped on the floor beside her, she had rested her head on the edge of the bed and had fallen asleep. The laceration on the red head’s side had been stitched and wrapped. Her chest was slowly moving up and down. He continued to watch the steady rise and fall to keep himself from thinking of the pain in his arm.

Jenkins took off his glasses and folded them into his shirt pocket, “Okay, that should do. Keep it in the sling for a few weeks Mr. Jones. Hopefully it will heal nicely.”

“Thanks Dad…” Ezekiel laughed. Jenkins shook his head, maybe he shouldn’t have given him such a high dose of painkillers. He watched as the Aussie’s eyes kept travelling back to the girl at the door.

“She’s going to be fine Mr. Jones.”

The younger man looked embarrassed that he had been caught staring, “Of course I know she’s okay, I basically saved her…”

A gruff voice sounded from the doorway, “Yeah, keep believin’ that lie, tiny man.”

Ezekiel grumbled as Jake entered the room. He hopped off the workbench and stuck his tongue out at the other librarian as he went over to the shiny metallic boiler to check out his new sling.

Baird stirred and rubbed the sleep out of her eyes. Remembering where she had drifted off, she whipped her head round to see if Cassandra was still beside her.

“She’s fine colonel. She needs her rest. You all do.”

Baird sighed, “I know, I just-…I can’t leave…”

“I understand colonel, but you all must rest if you want to be ready for her waking up.” Jenkins appealed to all three of them, “You know that she won’t be happy if she wakes up and finds you three zombies staring at her.”

Ezekiel started to move towards the doorway, “You don’t have to tell me twice to go relax…”

Jake finally relented after contemplating how disappointed Cassandra would be if she found out that they hadn’t gotten any rest because they were worrying about her.

Eve was the hardest to persuade. Jenkins had to set up another cot beside Cassandra’s for Eve to even consider sleep. At last, Baird lay her head down on the bed and let her eyes close for the second time that evening knowing that all her librarians were safe.


End file.
